On September 3, 1783, the Treaty of Paris officially ended the American Revolutionary War. Against all odds, the makeshift American militia, having endured 8 years of fighting, defeated the world’s strongest military to bring independence to the American people at last. Despite this great achievement, we observe Independence Day not on the 3rd of September, but instead on the 4th of July to celebrate the day in 1776 when the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence.

The Declaration of Independence is more than a statement of political autonomy. It plainly identifies a number of grievances against the King of Great Britain. But above all, it sets forth the fundamental principles that form the basis of American political thought. It acknowledges the inherent supremacy of “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God.” It proclaims that governments are established by the consent of the people to secure their natural rights to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” And it asserts that the people are not bound to sustain a government that infringes upon their rights, for it says that “whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government” committed to these ideals.

We celebrate Independence Day on July 4 because it marks the day when our nation formally dedicated itself to the preservation of our inalienable rights. Although the American people had endured the infringement of their rights for many years under British rule, on July 4, 1776, they made it known to all that they would suffer injustice no more.

Of course, many of the injustices listed in the Declaration of Independence were not so unbearable. Despite all the outrage over colonial taxation, for example, Americans were paying a lot less in taxes than their British counterparts in those days. But the American people revolted as a matter of principle—against the idea that an unrepresentative government could tax them at all—not because they regarded government as excessively oppressive.

Moreover, our founders feared that the British government’s illegitimate exercise of power, left unopposed, would grow stronger in time due to the apparent authority bestowed on precedential action. Thomas Paine wrote in Common Sense that “a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom.” The Declaration of Independence also pointed out “that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.” And James Madison observed, “Since the general civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people, by the gradual and silent encroachments of those in power, than by violent and sudden usurpations[.]” Our founders dreaded the thought that government’s slow advance against individual liberty in America might continue unchallenged, strengthening Britain’s hold on power and inviting further abuse.

To secure their liberty, the American people set out to permanently end the steady growth of British control over the colonies. But even after achieving this objective through victory in war, our founders recognized that independence did not guarantee lasting liberty. Given the tendency of every government to expand its influence, they advised the people to watch out for any increase in governmental power in America and, in particular, to oppose all illegitimate acts justified by precedent. Thomas Paine wrote in Rights of Man, “Government by precedent, without any regard to the principle of the precedent, is one of the vilest systems that can be set up. In numerous instances, the precedent ought to operate as a warning and not as an example”—it must “be shunned instead of imitated.” James Madison similarly instructed:

[I]t is proper to take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy to be the first duty of citizens and one of the noblest characteristics of the late revolution. The freemen of America did not wait until usurped power had strengthened itself by exercise, and entangled the question in precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle, and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle. We revere this lesson too much, soon to forget it.

Years later, Madison again urged the American people to guard against the expanse of government by invoking the principles underlying the revolution. He wrote:

The people of the U.S. owe their independence & their liberty, to the wisdom of descrying in the minute tax of 3 pence on tea, the magnitude of the evil comprised in the precedent. Let them exert the same wisdom, in watching against every evil lurking under plausible disguises, and growing up from small beginnings.

When we look at the broad scope of federal power today, it is clear that we have failed to curb the growth of our government. We’ve let federal power progressively advance beyond all limits in the Constitution, in contravention of the principles upon which our nation was formed. Government no longer preserves our inalienable rights to life, liberty, and property; in many ways, it controls them. For example, our president wields the power to kill Americans without due process of law. We are subjected to invasive searches anytime we travel. We are forced to abide by thousands of regulations crafted by unelected bureaucrats. Our property can be redistributed to the liking of those in office. And the list of arbitrary, oppressive powers goes on.

Indeed, it is tempting for us to look past these abuses and deny that despotism has come to America. We may even convince ourselves that our elective control over our representatives makes us a party to the policy choices thrust upon us—that we have nothing to complain about since our agents in government are supposedly executing our will. But our voting power amounts to nothing when government’s power is absolute. Thomas Paine explained, “It is not because a part of the government is elective, that makes it less a despotism, if the persons so elected possess afterwards, as a parliament, unlimited powers. Election in this case becomes separated from representation, and the candidates are candidates for despotism.”

The domineering government we have today was never the design of our founders—in the words of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, “An elective despotism was not the government we fought for.” But the government we have today needs not be the government we keep. By the principles of our founding, we have the power to change our government and secure our inalienable rights. Perhaps one day, we will act on these ideals to make Independence Day meaningful once again.

There is an inherent injustice in the government’s broad authority to tax and spend, which permits politicians to redistribute private property at will. In many cases, such arbitrary power amounts to theft masqueraded as law, and it defies the very essence of our being as Americans.
We are a people who once valued certain “self-evident” truths based on the idea that government is formed by consent to secure our natural rights. Samuel Adams explained that “the grand end of civil government, from the very nature of its institution, is for the support, protection, and defense of those very rights: the […] Continue Reading…

According to deficit forecasts in President Barack Obama’s latest budget, the national debt will surpass $20 trillion by 2016. If this occurs (and it is almost certain to occur), then Obama will add more to the national debt during his presidency than all prior presidents combined, despite collecting projected record-high tax receipts each year of his last term in office.
Obviously, there is a spending problem in Washington, D.C., and the reason for it is no mystery. The largest expenditure in Obama’s budget—and the largest federal outlay in every budget since 1970—is an expense item labeled “payments for individuals,” which […] Continue Reading…

Although the federal government had successfully operated without an income tax for 124 years under the Constitution, the American people in 1913 chose to ratify the Sixteenth Amendment, giving Congress the “power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived.” It is reasonable to expect that the people would not have granted such a broad power to the federal government unless circumstances required it. So what prompted this desperate action? Why was an income tax suddenly necessary in America 100 years ago?
In truth, it wasn’t needed at all. Total federal tax revenue was at an all-time […] Continue Reading…

When the American people were deciding whether to ratify the Constitution in 1787–88, they knew that the new federal government would possess greater authority than that granted to Congress under the Articles of Confederation. But they also expected that federal power would remain limited. After all, James Madison, “Father of the Constitution,” assured the people in January 1788 that the “powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the state governments are numerous and indefinite.”
This context is important when considering the true scope of the federal government’s commerce […] Continue Reading…

In 1787, the framers of the Constitution asked the American people to adopt a new political charter for the nation, and in the ensuing debates over the Constitution’s ratification, a common concern emerged among many: the federal government would become too powerful.
Skeptics of the new Constitution believed that a stronger national government might threaten state sovereignty and individual rights. Vocal opponents questioned whether the Constitution would restrain federal power in any way—one anonymous writer in the Maryland Gazette asked in 1788, “What limits are there to [federal] authority? I fear none at all.”
This widespread anxiety over the potential reach […] Continue Reading…

On March 1, 1781, the American people ratified the Articles of Confederation to officially establish the United States of America. This was kind of a big deal then, but it’s not something we celebrate today—remarkably, the birthday of our union doesn’t even merit a calendar entry as a simple reminder of its historical significance.
All for good reason, of course: the Articles of Confederation was an abject failure. The aim of government in America, as expressed in the Declaration of Independence, was to preserve the people’s natural rights to life, liberty, and property. The Articles, however, created a national government […] Continue Reading…

In 1776, the American people were at war, fighting to preserve the common principles that bound them together in society. They were fighting to defend the fundamental truths set forth in the Declaration of Independence “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
Today, we still celebrate our independence and pay tribute to our founding charter, but do we really understand it? Do we know the meaning of our creed? If we think Congress can regulate virtually every aspect of […] Continue Reading…

In his second inaugural address, Barack Obama challenged us to live out the meaning of our creed as stated in the Declaration of Independence. But he then redefined those ideals to suit his political aims. Change is necessary, he said, because “when times change, so must we.”
Yet our founding principles need no modification. As Abraham Lincoln once wrote, these principles are “applicable to all men and all times” and serve as “a rebuke and a stumbling block to the very harbingers of reappearing tyranny and oppression.”
To preserve liberty, we must defend our principles, not change them. And doing so […] Continue Reading…

Barack Obama will soon stand before Chief Justice John Roberts to recite the presidential oath of office—with his left hand on the Bible and his right hand raised, he’ll say:

I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

This oath, mandated by Article II of the Constitution, has sadly become nothing more than a ceremonial gesture. It is a mere formality, for after Barack Obama takes this solemn oath, he will […] Continue Reading…